In the Rhododendron

Yesterday I drank too much orange juice upon waking and went to Cobh with my husband, L, to visit his mom, B. Whenever we go to that strange island certain events transpire and I seem to absorb the old Pagan belief that places that are betwixt and between have a veil too easy to slip through to the other world. Places of two elements, like islands, bogs, springs, caves, very high mountains, etc. Anyway, I ended up in a forest just outside of B's fields that had been ruthlessly slashed to put in a telephone mast. The odd thing is that Ireland's forest protection agency sold the protected several hundred year old forest to the telephone company... fishy business. The company obviously destroyed far more of the forest than they needed because the trees look as though they they were cleared more or less at random. They never replanted the extra trees that were killed, so instead there is now a dense undergrowth of gorse, briers, and oddly enough many blooming rhododendrons. L and his mother went up ahead when suddenly I didn't feel like fighting my way through thorns and garbage to see more destruction. I decided to crawl under a nearby rhododendron and wait for them to return. Many leaves and petals had fallen on the rust-coloured earth: green and purple. They were so bright they seemed to shock my retinas, and I had to look away after many startling minutes. An arm reached out toward me that turned out to be a branch, and obligingly, I took it and began a slow tango. Dip, twirl, spin, this tree could do it all and very well considering it is a tree. When L and B returned, I promptly stopped dancing. L had two rhododendron stamens on the back of his t-shirt. It's difficult to explain to people that the tree wanted to dance while caught in the act, though much easier in writing, so I avoided it all together. I realized at that moment though that it is absolutely impossible to forget certain things. If someone experiences something lucidly enough, that memory is burned into a part of the brain. The mere act of recognizing something as salient means that you are aware of it, and if you can recall awareness it is impossible not to recall the event. Or so it seems. So now I'm recognizing awareness as often as I can, but it is exhausting to be so aware.